Fundamental AIrmanship Principles

[dutchroll]

This is just tragic Even well trained and highly qualified pilots can do it under pressure.

 

Always, always, check your flight controls. There is no excuse. It takes a few seconds, and ultimately once you get into the air, they're the only thing you've got! You can possibly scrape by without everything else.

 

http://www.c-130.net/c-130-news-article291.html

 

 

[turboplanner]

This is one of many similar results over the years usually from gust lock pins in place, some, unbelievably, with warning ribbons hang in down, from cattle rubbing on elevators during a lunch break, from bird nests built between flights.

 

Ironically very few student pilots forget the last check before flight "controls free and operating"

 

But Human Factors set in.........and the toll continues.

 

 

[IBob]

Nightmare stuff. And to that should be added loose items in cockpit, which can shift to jam controls at any time during flight. Cellphones and cameras come to mind.

 

 

[Robbo]

Nightmare stuff. And to that should be added loose items in cockpit, which can shift to jam controls at any time during flight. Cellphones and cameras come to mind.

I will dob myself in here, as a young avionics apprentice 15+ years ago I left a torch in the belly of an aircraft and while taxying for a test flight the rudder pedals became jammed.

I am glad it happened while on the ground and not at 5,000 feet. Yes a very very stupid thing to do.

 

That was the first and last time I ever did that.

 

 

[shafs64]

I always use a checklist before every flight and do a double check flight controls just before i taxi onto the runway. I once flew with a person did a start of the day preflight and we landed in three places before before we returned to the hanger.

 

 

[cooperplace]

Aristotle Onassis' son Alexander was killed in a plane crash that was said to be caused by mis-installation -reversing- of control cables; yes, never forget "controls free and correct". It takes about 2 seconds.

 

 

[Marty_d]

Aristotle Onassis' son Alexander was killed in a plane crash that was said to be caused by mis-installation -reversing- of control cables; yes, never forget "controls free and correct". It takes about 2 seconds.

How the hell does an aircraft go from (mis)installation of control cables to flight without anyone EVER waggling the controls and noticing they don't work properly?

 

One would assume that after installing control cables the controls would be tested for correct throw and limits. At that stage the noddy doing the testing would hopefully realize that up was down or left was right.... wouldn't he? Point is that it's like your mechanic swapping your brake and accelerator pedal positions... should never have got to the stage of flight.

 

 

[storchy neil]

bit like a certain rebuild taxie test going well while nose wheel did not come off ground but the first time that nose wheel left ground and rudder was prime direction control all hell broke lose more repairs needed neil

 

 

[Yenn]

If the controls were assembled incorrectly, then two qualified people would have checked them and missed the fault, before the pilot had a go.

 

Control maintenance has to be double checked by law. Even if all that is done is one connection being undone and done up again.

 

 

[dutchroll]

I guess it reinforces that the pilot's flight control check before takeoff is the absolute last line of defence.

 

During our basic pilot training it was so drilled into us....... "stick left, left aileron up, right aileron down........stick right, right aileron up, left aileron down.......stick back, elevators up.....stick forward, elevators down........rudder left, rudder right......full and free movement".

 

If you didn't do that it was an instant "fail" grade for the whole flight, and reprogramming for a "repeat". That was in addition to the tense debrief, and the punishment of running the length of the airfield to the runway "sight board" near the threshold and back, with your parachute on.

 

So nobody ever forgot a flight control check, to my knowledge!

 

 

[turboplanner]

Interesting dutch; for the first flight of my RC aircraft, the instructor did exactly that! Move the control; confirm the control surfaces moved correctly, and to their full extent.

 

 

[K-man]

This is just tragic Even well trained and highly qualified pilots can do it under pressure.Always, always, check your flight controls. There is no excuse. It takes a few seconds, and ultimately once you get into the air, they're the only thing you've got! You can possibly scrape by without everything else.

 

http://www.c-130.net/c-130-news-article291.html

Interesting scenario but understandable when we read that the elevator was raised to allow loading, so it wouldn't be pulled right back, just part way. During checks the controls may still have had enough play to be considered 'full and free' which would enable rotation and initial climb. The feeling would then be that the nose needed to be lowered and because the controls felt as if they were fully forward it must be a trim problem. By the time that was worked out the plane has stalled.

[facthunter]

The full movement, free and in correct sense was written into the early ANO's. In some planes you can't see the rudder. Ie Gazelle. so do it before entering the cockpit. With a primary control like elevator it might be worth while to apply a reasonable load to it as well if it doesn't have a back-up system that allows redundancy. If the elevator fails in most planes you are DEAD. Nev

 

 

[IBob]

How the hell does an aircraft go from (mis)installation of control cables to flight without anyone EVER waggling the controls and noticing they don't work properly?One would assume that after installing control cables the controls would be tested for correct throw and limits. At that stage the noddy doing the testing would hopefully realize that up was down or left was right.... wouldn't he? Point is that it's like your mechanic swapping your brake and accelerator pedal positions... should never have got to the stage of flight.

It happens. There was one over here many years ago, I don't know the details. Was a rebuild and then rolled on takeoff...as you would. I would guess that while we all check the control surfaces are waggling fully and freely, most of us don't actually pause to check they're waggling in the right direction. I would have to say I haven't been...but I shall be from now on.

 

 

[IBob]

Right. Next item for stall on takeoff: shifting load. There's a terrific bit in Ernest K Gann's 'Fate is the Hunter' where he describes taking off in in DC2 (I think), with some ground antenna steelwork in the back....and it's all vibrated down to the tail.

 

Come to think of it, if anyone hasn't read the book, it's a classic, and rightly so. Highly recommended.

 

 

[Old Koreelah]

...it was so drilled into us....... "stick left, left aileron up, right aileron down........stick right, right aileron up, left aileron down.......stick back, elevators up.....stick forward, elevators down........rudder left, rudder right......full and free movement"...

Much easier to remember:

 

Control surfaces should rise to meet stick inputs.

 

 

[Head in the clouds]

How the hell does an aircraft go from (mis)installation of control cables to flight without anyone EVER waggling the controls and noticing they don't work properly?One would assume that after installing control cables the controls would be tested for correct throw and limits. At that stage the noddy doing the testing would hopefully realize that up was down or left was right.... wouldn't he? Point is that it's like your mechanic swapping your brake and accelerator pedal positions... should never have got to the stage of flight.

I quite agree Marty, it's hard to believe it can happen, but it can, and does, even to the best of us.

 

Sander Veenstra is a name well known to anyone who was around the ultralight scene in the late 1970s and 80s. Sander was probably the most prolific builder of planes in Australia. He had a workshop that I spent a lot of time in, at Officer, near Berwick to the East of Melbourne.

 

By around 1983/4 he had outgrown that workshop and he moved to Tocumwal for a short while then purchased a tract of land that had a private airstrip and large shed at Nagambie, near Mangalore. The demand for his planes was strong and for some time he had been building planes in batches of six and was working all hours, both to meet the demand, and to pay the substantial debt he'd entered into. Initially he'd been building planes that were most like motorgliders, they had a single wheel, inverted V tail and a relatively small 18hp direct drive pusher engine. He was achieving glide ratios around 18-20:1 and he'd attracted the attention of some notable people, Bert Flood, for example, owned a number of Sander's planes and Sir Jack Brabham was another keen participant.

 

The ultralight market, however, was moving toward more conventional powered planes and the design of each of Sander's new batches were morphing that way a little at a time. By the time of his sad event his planes had a conventional two-wheeled taildragger landing gear and the V tail was now upright rather than inverted, they were a very slick little machine called the Farmate (or Farm-mate) - that was the eleventh production design and he'd built a total of around 50-60 planes by that stage including two two-seat trainers, a single engined tractor design and twin pusher called the Tardis that's still around, I last saw it not too long ago at Watts Bridge in Queensland.

 

I don't know all the details because I'd moved away from the area shortly before the fateful time, so the rest was told to me by others.

 

He had almost completed the latest batch of six when he ended up making a change to the control system. I'm not certain whether he had decided to change the whole batch, or whether he was upgrading a plane that came in for servicing to the current spec, either way the design change moved the engine mounting a little, repositioned the control mixer for the V tail and, if I understand it correctly, also moved an overhead bellcrank for the aileron pushrods near the mainspar mounting.

 

Sander was tired but always gave a comprehensive test-flying regime to each plane before delivery to, or collection by, the customer. The changes had delayed the completion dates and he was in a hurry to meet agreed delivery times. He fired it up, completed his taxi and controls checks, applied full power and took off, climbed straight ahead to 150ft or so and, confident pilot and person that he was, he rolled hard into a left bank. Or rather he tried to, the plane flicked into a spin and impacted the ground more-or-less vertical, it was all over in a second.

 

The accident investigation was straightforward, Sander's modification had reversed the sense of the aileron operation and he, talented and meticulous as he was, hadn't picked up on it during the conversion(s) nor during his pre-flight controls check. Even though he was a long-time glider pilot - and glider pilots are very careful with the 'free AND correct sense' checks, because gliders are assembled and dis-assembled so frequently.

 

Those who knew him well put it down to hurrying due to tiredness and financial pressures, but it's still astounding to think someone so experienced and knowledgeable could have missed that issue for so long, he would have been 'around' the matter for days while doing the work on them. We lost a very talented designer/builder that day.

 

 

 

 

[dutchroll]

Much easier to remember:Control surfaces should rise to meet stick inputs.

I never said the RAAF did things the easy way! But by the time you'd repeated it dozens of times it just flowed off the tongue.

 

 

[storchy neil]

after landing at an airport I was leaving to go and doing my walk around when I was approached by a person who wanted to know why I did a complete magi check on shut down and shut down on one magi and why I pushed down on the tail of my aircraft and moved the rudder through its full movement

 

my answer was why don't you do it

 

his reply you don't have to do that

 

to witch I replied so things only break while you are flying

 

he walked away

 

when I and others were building the wallaby at temora he came up to me and asked did I remember him and that he now understood why I did what I did

 

some times what is a stupid reply will make you take notice neil

 

 

[Guest SrPilot]

Right. Next item for stall on takeoff: shifting load. There's a terrific bit in Ernest K Gann's 'Fate is the Hunter' where he describes taking off in in DC2 (I think), with some ground antenna steelwork in the back....and it's all vibrated down to the tail. Come to think of it, if anyone hasn't read the book, it's a classic, and rightly so. Highly recommended.

Perhaps the most dramatic reminder to ensure that the cargo is loaded and restrained properly can be seen in these videos. (viewer warning - not for everyone).

 

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2317306/Boeing-747-crash-video-Tragic-stories-emerge-seven-Americans-killed.html

 

 

The NTSB accident report is here:

 

http://www.ntsb.gov/news/events/Documents/2015_Bagram_BMG_DCA13MA081_Abstract.pdf

 

Conclusion - rolling cargo and no good comes from that.

 

Certainly a tragic event.

 

 

[Gnarly Gnu]

Conclusion - rolling cargo and no good comes from that.

Hey Sr I think it was Dutch that posted a link just the other day to this incident being caused by the case of night vision goggles inadvertently being left to block elevator movement. Or am I confusing with another accident?

 

 

[SDQDI]

Hey Sr I think it was Dutch that posted a link just the other day to this incident being caused by the case of night vision goggles inadvertently being left to block elevator movement. Or am I confusing with another accident?

Dutch was talking about a C130, your vid says a 747?

 

 

[Guest SrPilot]

Hey Sr I think it was Dutch that posted a link just the other day to this incident being caused by the case of night vision goggles inadvertently being left to block elevator movement. Or am I confusing with another accident?

Hi GnGn. As I recall, there was speculation or perhaps a finding that the Captain used his NVG case to hold full elevator up during the loading process to keep the elevator out of the way of some large vehicles. The theory was that the case was not removed before flight, which caused a high angle of climb upon rotation resulting in a cargo shift aft leading to a stall. The ultimate finding on the cause though was:

 

"The National Transportation Safety Board determines that the probable cause of this accident was National Airlines’ inadequate procedures for restraining special cargo loads, which resulted in the loadmaster’s improper restraint of the cargo, which moved aft and damaged hydraulic systems Nos. 1 and 2 and horizontal stabilizer drive mechanism components, rendering the airplane uncontrollable. Contributing to the accident was the Federal Aviation Administration’s inadequate oversight of National Airlines’ handling of special cargo loads."

 

 

[SDQDI]

Am I missing something?

 

One seems to be a c130 with 11 dead while the other seems to be a 747 with 7 dead

 

 

[Guest SrPilot]

Am I missing something? One seems to be a c130 with 11 dead while the other seems to be a 747 with 7 dead

You are correct SDQDI. I wasn't thinking. The C130 above was the NVG case event. The 747 which I posted was the rolling cargo. I went to work at 5 a.m. today; it's after 10 p.m. and I'm still working. Tried to answer Gnarly's query without clearing the webs. Just juxtaposed one event onto another. That's why I do not fly after 17 hours at work.